Using science to prioritize green design strategies.

If you are a designer or engineer new to sustainability, how do you know where to start? How do you avoid greenwashing and spend development time or money wisely?

Productdesign.green uses quantitative data from life cycle assessments to show you the largest environmental impacts for different product categories. It then suggests eco-design strategies to improve them.

Simply click on one of the product categories above to see its one-page downloadable guide. Each guide graphs the environmental impacts of the product by life-cycle stage; these graphs combine climate change, pollution, resource consumption, human health, and other impacts into single scores. Five or more academic sources are used for each product category, to ensure data quality. The graphs also show the data uncertainty, arising from different life cycle assessment methodologies, design variations, manufacturing locations, customer usage habits, and other differences. Sometimes these uncertainties are large, but usually the priorities for green design are still clear.
Attached to the graphs are recommendations for green design strategies to reduce impacts, or turn negative impacts into positive, regenerative benefits.

The team:
Productdesign.green was created by professor Jeremy Faludi and several dedicated students: Emily Martinez, Soon Young Shimizu, Jonathan Klein, and Lylia Eng.

If you have feedback, or want to get involved, email prof. Jeremy Faludi.